Wednesday, 11 January 2012

Infant Philosophy

'What am I?' asks my son.
'A boy,' I reply, not listening.
'What's a boy?'
'A boy is someone with a ... A boy is human who is male.'
'What's a yewmanooizmale?'
My daughter is pondering separate cosmic mysteries on the sofa.
'Why does cat poo smell?'

These untiring interrogations exasperate me. They distract me from the serious business of the White Stuff catalogue or the Met Office weather bulletin. They also unnerve me, for their infant logic exposes the vastness of my own unknowingness. 'Why did Jesus have to die?' asks my daughter and I discover that, despite sharing a house with a theological library, I flounder. 'Why is water wet?' 'Why don't we have three arms?' 'Why doesn't my Lego tip over when Earth turns round?' I don't know and I don't know and I don't know.

Lately the questions have become more focused and just as foxing. 'What is eight times 13,' asks the nine-year-old, hunched over her maths homework. 'Who was Henry VIII's fourth wife?' 'Why do you never know the answer to anything I ask you?'

I wonder then why it takes children to reveal the holes in my intellect. In adult gatherings I can maintain a semblance of worldly wisdom as we debate how to remove ketchup stains from lambswool and whether Jason Donovan should have won Strictly Come Dancing. At which point the answer blinds me. The weight of years and insomnia have innured most of us to life's philosophical questions. My brain buzzes with shopping lists and school dates. I lack the mental space and energy to ponder why the wind is windy or what is the essence of Boy.

I am sobered by this. By the time the children are flown and I have the leisure of my own unimpeded thoughts, my mind will have shrunk too small to recapture cosmic curiosity.

I resolve to revise Tudors and times tables and to look up Existentialism on Wikipedia. And next time my son asks me why cats don't need hair cuts, I shall rejoice in his quest for enlightenment, even though my answer will be 'Don't know'.

My sister said that every time her boys asked a question she sort of knew the answer but the real crux of it was always just outside her range of knowledge - every single time. And we are not stupid or uneducated people.

I think you should go proactive. #1 give them the answer and see if they can get the question. #2 share with them the knowledge you *do* possess e.g. "Yes" in Japanese is "hai", Italians think parmesan on pasta/ fish sauce is a crime, 4x13 is 52.

Such a brilliantly written and, for me, poignant post. My husband was only saying the other day that where had his curiosity and thirst for knowledge that he had as a little boy gone. Perhaps the answer is is that we parents knock it out of them. How sad. Sorry - I did love the post honest!

Here is a small collection of facts imparted by the littler boy (now 6) on the way to school last term: he told me about the flying habits of plated armadillos, that skips were mostly yellow but that he had just seen a green one, asked why squirrels had knuckles (for knocking nuts apparantly), pointed out caterpillar eggs on leaves, then swerved back onto the eating habits of flying armadillos (wood, metal, fish fingers, broccoli and mashed potato, and cliffs since you ask.)

It is the law that all mothers lose their marbles so that kids can gradually acquire the sensation that they are gaining independence from the foolish life-form they will come to know one day simply as 'oh Mother!'

I think what my daughter meant was why did God arrange it that Jesus had to die as a scape goat. I was about to open my mouth and offer the usual platitudes when suddenly I saw it in a new light and was silenced. The Kitkat would have been a much better idea!

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About Me

As a vicar's wife I bake cakes and memorise the parish ailments. As a mother I occasionally feed and occasionally counsel an 11-year-old son and an 13-year-old daughter. As a journalist I am a part-time staff feature writer on The Guardian and a freelancer. Tartan sofa rugs, herbaceous perennials and a nightly lager hold it all together.